Twenty Eleven

Ok people listen up. Y'all need to let go of this Two thousand, eleven stuff already. It's 20-11. I mean do you really want to be saying two thousand, twenty-two in 11 years? No. You don't. And our kids' kids' kids don't want to be saying two thousand, one hundred, eleven in a 100 years either. It is time to embrace the twenty people. It will hurt at first, and you'll occasionally slip back into your old ways, but I do believe that if you stick with it you'll find yourself happier on the other side.  Triumph over adversity. You'll thank me, really.

So anyway, business first. Here is the winning comment for the December Daily Starbucks Ornament:

Ndirishlover 1 month ago

I'm going with three. I feel it in my blood. Besides I already found a spot on my tree for the holy ornament.

DISQUS is being a punk right now by not letting me log in to check to see if you included an email with your comment. I'll check back later, but if you happen to come across this first, you can shoot me an email at Mellon(at)MellonBlogs(dot)com with your mailing addy, and I'll get your ornament sent out ASAP. 

Let's see what else? Oh yes. My resolutions for the new year.  You may recall that last year I chose the word "Open" as my word of the year--if you don't recall or never knew in the first place and are curious--you can read about it by clicking here. While I still have quite a ways to go on this one, I do believe that I've made enough progress that I can keep working on it while simultaneously tackling another goal for this year. So what will the new word be?

Finish

Yes, finish. You see, I have the kind of personality that bounces around from idea to idea like a pinball rattling around inside an 80s arcade game. I vibrate with so much excitement when I take on a new project that I have to completely immerse myself in it--obsessively devouring any and all information pertaining to whatever plan has taken root inside my head. For a time, this new interest is what sustains me, it's my only focus. I am driven.  This period can last anywhere from an hour to a month to a year. But then I get bored. Or distracted by something else. Or lazy. And I never finish any of these endeavors--at least not to the point that I'm happy with. So this year, I will finish something. Or hopefully a lot of somethings. Ok, that's lofty. How about a couple of somethings? As in:

• My Spanish Rosetta Stone Program. I started out so well with this last year. I'd spend 30 minutes on it everyday and was really feeling my buried wannabe-part-Latina breaking free. But then the blizzards came. And with them, the children stuck in the house all day. And me stuck with them. So I couldn't find both the free 30 minutes and the necessary working brain cells to continue on. Once the habit was broken, I never found my way back. But this year, I will. I will complete the entire first set of lessons. I will FINISH.  And then I will beg/plead/demand that my husband buy me the next set.
• My novel(s) Thanks to NaNoWriMo and a writing class I took last spring, I have 3 half-finished novels hanging around. Which is absurd. So, I will finish one of them. This year. Done. Finito. Please note though that I am not resolving to actually make it a good novel, just a completed one. Big difference. 

So there you have it. My 2011 word. And I think I'll go get started on it right away by finishing off that cupcake that is sitting in my fridge. I do believe that this year is going to go just swimmingly. 

I am the Champion...

Yo Internets, I did it! December Daily has been pwned! Tomorrow or the next day, I'll go through the old comments and see who came the closest to guessing 0 as the number of days I'd miss out on posting this month. That optimistic soul will become the proud owner of her very own Starbucks ornament--if she is willing to email her address. I wouldn't be offended if she isn't, I know I must seem like a complete looney bird. But who knows, maybe she's willing to walk on the wild side. We'll see.

So anyway...December 31st. December Done. Last day of 2010. Twenty 10. Over. Crazy right? So I think for this double final post, I'll share with you the 2011 resolutions of my children--or what I imagined they'd be if they had any idea what a resolution was.

#1--Chase and Amaya do hereby resolve to study hard and continue the strengthening of the grey matter inside their little noggins.

#2: Chase does hereby resolve to continue working toward his ultimate goal of becoming a 4 year old rock star. 

#3 Amaya does hereby resolve to start her own company by the age of 3. Her latest brainstorm is a cleaning service that performs show tunes while dusting. I'm sure it will be a hit.

As for my resolutions? Well I'm still ironing out the details there. I'll get back to you on that, deal?

Practice Makes Legible

I know he's four, but it still seems too soon. How can Chase be learning to write his name and the letters of the alphabet already? But he is, and taking much glee in the effort I might add. I do feel kind of bad for him, because genetically speaking he has a lot of predetermined poor penmanship bias to overcome.

On his paternal side, we have Andy whose handwriting is simply atrocious. His signature can't even be read as it most strongly resembles the Nike swoosh rather than any actual letters of the alphabet. This is probably because he's a man and doesn't care though. I'm sure the potential for lovely script is there lying dormant.

On the maternal side things don't look much better.My grade school report cards were always filled with VGs (Very Goods) in every subject but handwriting. Those I got Ss (satisfactory--barely) This may have had something to do with being left handed and that whole right slant mess coupled with not holding my pencil/hand/paper/arm/body/temper correctly. Luckily, Chase is right handed--which means he has less chance of being a genius but a better chance at having neat handwriting. Pretty even trade off I'd say.

So as I was saying, Chase enjoys practicing forming his letter and numbers. And he's getting pretty good at it too. At least as far as tracing goes.

But he can also make those little symbols from scratch as demonstrated by the 13 & 15 he wrote while waiting for our dinner at Fuddrucker's.

So with all of this joy over the acquisition of new skills, you can imagine that we've been spending a lot of time drawing, writing and coloring here in MellonLand. Which brings me to this:

I saw this green Tupperware container at the thrift store a while back and had to buy it and its yellow friend. I had no idea what I was going to do with it, but I knew I needed to possess it. Why? Because when I was just a kid earning straight Ss in handwriting, my mother had a big blue one just like it. Whenever she would make No Bake Cookies, she would put them in that blue container. This was wise on her part because as a child, I was completely incapable of getting the lid to close on that sucker. Thus, she always knew when I had swiped an extra cookie or three. Not that the certainty of being caught ever stopped me or anything.

Anyway, I quickly found a use for my little memory lane props:

And they fit so perfectly in my--I mean the children's--coloring basket

which has the perfect home in the kitchen cabinets below the phone.

So now any time my little darlings want to color, write or draw--I just pull out the basket and they have everything they need right at their little fingertips. When they're done, we just pack it all back up, slide it on the shelf, and close the door. Viola! I might not have the neatest handwriting, but I make up for it with my organization and ingenuity. VG all the way.